


The drift is silence

by caprigender



Category: Danny Phantom, Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pacific Rim Fusion, Gen, Trans Male Character, trans danny fenton
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-19
Updated: 2015-11-01
Packaged: 2018-04-10 01:32:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4372001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caprigender/pseuds/caprigender
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After an accident in his parents' lab leaves him unable to drift with his father, Danny wonders what this could mean for his future as a Jaeger pilot.<br/>Fortunately, his father has a plan to fix that.</p><p>An au that I got waaaaay too invested in.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by ghost-chicky's au pic on their tumblr.
> 
> I have a tendency to emotionally overinvest.
> 
> As for the way this works, kaiju come through the drift regularly every two to six months so Jaegers continued to be used as a viable world protecting option.

The drift is silence. That’s what all the professors tell you when they prepare you for your first neural handshake. You have to teach yourself to ignore the stories and paths that flash before your mind’s eye. Memories well up and only some of them are yours but you must resist the curiosity, the nostalgia, and every impulse you have to catch these thoughts and hold on as tight as you can. The voices and the flashing lights must be ignored. Chasing the RABIT causes misalignment, causes distraction, causes accidents. Stay in the drift. The drift is silence.

Danny knows this isn’t entirely true. The “silence” all his teachers refer to isn’t complete. It’s really more of a relative thing. It’s like when your brain learns to tune out the humming of the refrigerator or the whirring of fan blades on a hot summer day. The goal is to forget the noise is there. You adapt. You grow accustomed to the base level of shared thoughts between you and your drift partner. Their thoughts echo quietly in the back of your mind and you know that they are there, along with everything they’ve ever dreamed, remembered and regretted. But you push it aside and you focus on the task at hand and you forget that there was a time when this presence wasn’t there. It’s comfortable and it’s comforting and the more you drift the more used to it you become.

His father’s mind was loud in the drift. Everything about Jack Fenton was loud, so it made sense for his thoughts to be, too. His memories and dreams boomed through the PONs, drowning out anything Danny brought in. His fears, his nightmares, his insecurities, everything was blown away as the background noise of his father’s neural link stifled Danny’s lack of confidence. In the drift, he could do anything. In the drift, his father’s expectations of him weren’t unreachable and he knew he could save the entire world because his father believed he could do it.

Danny Fenton was going to become a jaeger pilot with his old man and they were going to save humanity.

At least, that had been the plan. Before the accident in his parents’ lab, Danny had been destined for greatness. His parents worked as scientists and emergency backup jaeger pilots in the military base in San Francisco. He was going to the training academy next door, scraping by on barely passing grades and the reputation of his family. He told himself that the grades didn’t matter as much. When it got down to it, being a pilot wasn’t something that could be taught in a school setting. He had been training for this his entire life, way before he’d started at the academy. Danny had been born into the world of jaeger pilots. He lived and breathed it. He’d figured that sort of experience could never be taken away.

That was really the most jarring part of the accident. Danny wasn’t entirely sure what he was meant to be if he couldn’t drift. He’d already spent years in the academy. He had a decent simulator score. He even had a drift partner who had been out in the field before. What was he supposed to do if he wasn’t a pilot?

In the weeks of recovery this was the question he spent most of his time avoiding. He napped, he watched TV, he played video games, he talked with his closest friends on Skype. He rested and hoped that he would never be well enough for people to start asking him what his new plan was.

He figured he didn’t have all that much time left over. It was only a month and a half until his next year of training was supposed to start and no one had felt brave enough to ask what good another year in the academy would do for a rookie who’d lost his drift ability. Somebody would have to bite the bullet and start that conversation soon enough but Danny was determined that it would not be him. No thank you, he would sit right there in the hospital room taking meds and submitting to tests and definitely not dwelling on whatever his future might look like now.

Danny’s laptop speakers blipped a few times with notifications from his chat window. He turned the volume down on the TV.

“look, Tucker, all I’m saying is that the ultrarecyclo vegetarian diet is a way more efficient way to use ration cards”

“yeah, that’s because no one else wants to eat that crap! You can pick it up for cheap cause its actually just the worst”

“ugh, Danny back me up on this, would you?”

Danny chuckled to himself. “sorry, Sam. Tucker has a point.” He typed, “Not that I really know anything about ration cards. I just eat from the mess hall. It’s no five star restaurant but some of the food is really tasty”

“oh man, that sounds like a sick deal. Can’t wait til I’m working jaeger tech! Living in barracks, hanging with jaeger pilots, calibrating laser cannons! It’s gonna be sweet!”

“oh yes, three cheers for the carnival of violence” Sam responded sarcastically.

“I mean, as long as the carnival of violence is stopping the rampaging kaiju…” Danny answered.

“DANNY!” Jazz’s voice could be heard from down the hall. She must have been traveling fast because only a moment later she burst into the room almost out of breath. “Danny, you have to come with me. Mom and Dad want you with them in the lab as soon as possible. Are you ok to move?”

Danny snorted at the question. He’d been ok to move less than a week after he’d been admitted to the medical ward. “Sure, I’m fine. Can I maybe get dressed first?” Jazz nodded, already throwing him a pair of jeans and a t shirt from the laundry basket on the floor.  
“I’ll wait outside for you to get ready, but hurry.”

“Wait! Jazz!” Danny yelled after her, “What even is going on here?”

“They said they found you someone drift compatible!”

~ ~ ~

The lab was surprisingly unchanged since the last time Danny saw it. It was cluttered and messy and there were at least eight different half-finished projects on each table. It looked exactly like his parents always left it.

The drift chamber was no longer surrounded by yellow caution tape and Danny wasn’t sure if that was because they didn’t think it was dangerous anymore or if they accidentally took it down and forgot to replace it. Either way, he stayed far away from the yellow and black striped doors.

“-and that’s when I had the brilliant idea! I knew I’d seen these exact symptoms somewhere else! Or I’d at least heard of them before! I gotta say, Danny, you sure are lucky your old man is still staying sharp! We’ll have you drifting again in no time!” Jack Fenton had been going on about his brilliant discovery for quite some time. Danny was only half listening.

“So, who even is this guy?” he asked.

Maddie set an old drift helmet on the tabletop next to him. The thing looked like it hadn’t been used in years. “Oh, Vlad’s a dear old friend of ours from college, worked with us on a lot of research. He was your father’s drift partner before we really buckled down into our work.”

Danny’s jaw dropped. His parents never reminisced about the old days. He hardly knew anything about what their lives had been like before him and Jazz. He’d known that his parents used to be Jaeger pilots, but not with each other. He’d never heard of anyone named Vlad before.

“Yep! Vlad Masters, a real stand up kinda guy! I’d trust him with my life!”

“He’s flying in all the way from Wisconsin to try this little experiment.”

“Wisconsin?” Danny sputtered. That was right smack in the middle of the continent. “Just how rich is this guy?”

Maddie laughed, “oh, he made it big when he left. Last I heard he’s living in a castle, right Jack?”

“A castle? Not just that! A state of the art fortress, really!”

Danny let out a low whistle. Ever since k-day the further inland you lived the richer people got. Money could buy safety as long as you lived nowhere near the pacific coastline. A tiny shack in Oklahoma could cost thousands of times more than the flashiest mansions in California. A castle in Wisconsin? Danny wasn’t even sure what the ballpark cost of that might be.

The doors of the lab’s cargo elevator creaked open, revealing a well-dressed man in a ponytail flanked by three other men Danny didn’t recognize.

“Vladdie!” Jack yelled, running to embrace the man. Form the way the other people in the elevator tensed up, Danny decided they were probably bodyguards. Incompetent body guards, at that. Jack already had the man off the ground in what seemed to be a very unwanted hug. It lasted surprisingly short for a Fenton hug. Soon the man was straightening out his fancy suit and trying to get a read on the room. “Can’t tell you how glad we are to see you again, V-man.”

Vlad Masters grimaced at the nickname. “Yes, well, anything for old friends, I suppose.” His eyes landed on Maddie and he actually smiled. “Charmed to see you again, my dear. I hear you have someone you would like me to meet?”

“You betcha, Vlad my main man!” Jack set a hand on Danny’s shoulder. “Vlad, this is Danny.” Danny straightened up in his seat and held a hand out to Vlad. The other man smiled at him and accepted the handshake.

“Danny’s been at the academy for two years now,” Maddie explained as she continued setting up the old school PONs device. “He’s been doing very well. Danny, tell Mr. Masters you simulator score.”

Danny flinched. Leave it to his parents to embarrass him in front of his new possible drift partner. “Thirty two drops, twenty nine kills.” He admitted.

“Impressive work.” Vlad said, “Especially considering your previous copilot. Does he ever let you get a thought in during training?”

The biting hostility of the man’s tone was lost on Jack who laughed out loud. “What can I say? He knows me too well. What a joker!”

“Of course,” Vlad responded dryly. It didn’t seem to Danny like the man was joking.

“Well then, I’ve got the PONs set up,” Maddie said, handing Vlad and Danny their own helmets. “Why don’t we get started?”

“Sure.” Danny strapped the helmet on with the ease of experience. “Just, if you see a door labeled ‘Danny’s embarrassing memories, do not open’ it’s definitely nothing interesting at all.” He laughed nervously.

Vlad chuckled darkly. “Please, Daniel, there are no secrets between drift partners.”

Danny gulped.

“Ready boys? Initiating neural handshake.” His mom was busy flipping switches and turning dials. Danny took a deep breath, forcing himself not to tense up. “Contact in three…”

He cleared his mind, just like in training. He’d done it a thousand times before. This was no different.

“Two…”

Sure this would decide his entire future career, this was his last chance to be a pilot, but that was no reason to freak out.

“One…”

He braced for the drift. Or heart breaking disappointment.

“Engage.”

~ 

The familiar gut wrenching sensation of connecting through the PONs nearly knocked the breath from his lungs and brought tears to his eyes. Familiar memories flashed before him. Christmas at his grandmothers’ when he was five. Jazz in braces trying to teach him drift psychology. His binder finally coming in the mail. Sam and Tucker traveling down to see him in person for the first time. The drift was filled with the thrill of their success.

He could feel other memories coming through as well. He could see the horror of watching the first kaiju attack on TV. His hands deftly manipulated the wiring of a sketchy looking neural helmet and felt a rush of pride when he got it working again. He glanced over, grinning to the woman next to him. The look on her face was pure scientific excitement and he thought he’d never seen anything that beautiful before. Gosh Maddie was a gorgeous woman.

Danny did a double take as he recognized what exactly he had just seen and felt. Vlad knew what had just happened, too. He could feel the other man’s panic. He’d clearly seen something he wasn’t meant to. He tried to stay calm. This was weird, weird as hell, but it was nothing to get thrown out of alignment for.

Just as that thought passed through his mind he felt the drift go blank. He was alone again, alone with his memories in a sheer vast mental silence.

Utter silence.

Danny panicked. He was still in the drift, he could feel it, but this was like nothing he had ever experienced before. Emptiness. What had happened to Vlad?

Nothing. He felt the answer echoing in his head. Nothing had happened to Vlad.

Vlad was doing this, himself. Vlad was doing this on purpose.

Danny’s head jerked to the side and he could feel himself hyperventilating. He was dully aware of his mother’s voice.

“They’re out of alignment!” she warned, “Vlad? Danny? You’re both out of alignment, can you hear me? I need you to focus on stabilizing.”

His hands curled into fists subconsciously. His thoughts were too loud. He couldn’t focus. And where was the familiar buzzing of the drift?

“Maddie, disconnect us.” Vlad’s voice seemed to come from miles away even though Danny knew he was only a few feet to his right.

“Vlad?”

“Disconnect us, Maddie, he’s chasing the RABIT.”

Liar. Danny screwed his eyes shut and clenched his teeth, willing his thoughts to be quiet or a least quieter than they were being. His memories still bombarded him. His computer crashing in the middle of a homework project he hadn’t saved. Kids at the academy taunting him about his apparent lack of a drift partner. Failed tests, retaking classes, gender confusion, countless awful memories that were only made worse by the fact that he was now reliving them with a total stranger in his head. A stranger who apparently didn’t want this trust going both ways.

With a mechanical whirring sound, the drift was shut off. The memories faded from his mind and his consciousness came fully back to the real world. He was sitting on a stool in his parents’ lab. His arms shook.

“Danny?” Maddie asked, tentatively, “Are you alright?” Danny took a shivering breath.

“Alright?! Of course he’s alright!” Jack’s voice boomed through the lab, “He can drift again! I told you two I’d find a way! Did I say it or not? I was right! Sure there was a rough patch with the misalignment but what do you expect!? You two haven’t drifted with anyone for quite a while! Don’t worry about it, you’ll be drifting right as rain in no time!”

Danny glanced over at Vlad. His face was blank and unreadable. His eyes looked bloodshot from the stress of the drift. He looked at Danny and smiled. Then he stood up and straightened out his suit again, tucking a strand of silver hair back behind his ear.

“I certainly look forward to it.” He said, “Now if you don’t mind, I have to arrange for my things to be sent over here. I believe I will be staying longer than expected.”


	2. Chapter 2

“Empty? Like, /empty/ empty like completely void of all things?”

Danny nodded. “Everything except what I brought in.” he’d been brought back to the main medical ward for post drift tests and after being poked at and monitored by doctors for at least an hour he was finally free to talk to his friends in privacy.

“I’m no drift pilot, but I’m pretty sure that’s kind of not possible. Right?” Sam asked.

“Kind of?!” Tucker’s voice came through the speakers crackly. Sam flinched on screen and pulled one of her ear buds out. “That’s not just kind of not possible it’s absolutely impossible. I’ve never heard of a person being able to completely hide their thoughts from their drift partner during a neural link! Even the best of the best couldn’t hide things completely!”

“Wait, hold up,” Sam leaned towards her webcam “are you telling me it’s possible to hide things from people when you’re mind smooshing with them? I thought there’s supposed to be a no secrets policy between pilots. The more you share the more effective fighters you are.”

“Essentially, yeah. That’s why they generally choose people who are related. I mean, some really experienced pilots could sort of do it, though.” Danny shrugged.

“Stacker Pentecost got good enough to drift with anyone!”

“Stacker Pentecost could do basically anything,” Danny said. “He’s kind of a legend.”

“Yeah, I’ve heard of him, actually,” Sam continued. “Head of the Jaeger program back at the beginning of the war, right?”

“Jaeger academy 101 here in the Skype chat,” Tucker said, grinning.

Sam rolled her eyes, “yeah yeah, I get it, I am so inexperienced compared to you two.”

“Just telling it like it is.” Danny chuckled at his friends.

“Yeah, well I’d like to see you two try and organize protests and food drives in an alien-robot warzone some time, see how good you are at it.”

“-this way Mr. Masters, we just have a few more tests we need to-“ Danny heard one of the orderlies pleading with the man in the hallway.

“Well, I would wish you luck finding anything, but I really must be going.”

“Sir, sir?” the voices moved further down the hallway and Danny swung himself off the hospital bed. His bare feet padded against the chill concrete floor.

“Sorry guys, gotta go,” Danny whispered, snapping his laptop closed.

“Danny what-“

He poked his head through the door, checking for nurses or anyone else who might tell him to get back in bed, then he crept softly after the voices he’d heard. 

“Really, sir, these tests,” the orderly protested, “We have to make sure there were no mistakes-“

“Mistakes or not, you and I both know you’re not going to get a satisfying reading.” Masters drawled in an obnoxiously confident tone.

Danny slowed to a stop a yard or two from where the two were arguing. It didn’t look like Masters was going to be making any sort of compromise. He stood in front of the elevator door, clearly waiting for it to reach this floor. Danny figured the only reason the conversation had even lasted this long was because Masters seemed to be without his three skeevy bodyguards.

“Please sir, it’s just protocol,” the orderly sighed, they were clearly not paid enough to be dealing with this stubborn of a patient. “Look, I don’t want to have to go get the orders for these tests from the higher ups, but if that’s what it will take, I’ll do it.”

“Please, be my guest,” Vlad snarled, calling after the other man as he stalked down the hallway in a huff, “good luck on all that paperwork, dear.” 

Danny waited a moment, watching the aftermath. He wasn’t entirely sure what he was trying to accomplish, but he’d already come this far and the millionaire was still waiting for the elevator to arrive. He straightened up and set his shoulders back. Look big, talk sharp, exude confidence.

“Masters!”

A look of surprise passed over the man’s face, quickly replaced by a deceptively friendly smile. “Ah, Daniel, out enjoying the sweet smell of antiseptic and kaiju-blue poisoning in this third-rate med bay?”

“It’s Danny. I was just wondering why you were leaving so early. This place seems right up your alley. Very morgue like.” He shot back, “so, what the hell happened today?”

The older man dropped the smile and looked at Danny as if he was something distasteful he’d just scraped off the bottom of his shoe. “Hm, hostile. What do you mean, my boy?”

“You know what I mean,” Danny glared, “The drift today… how do you even do that?” He meant to keep his voice angry. This man was endangering him and his entire future. Still, some amazement crept up in his question. He couldn’t help it if he was curious.

Vlad chuckled, his face cracking into a genuine grin. “Oh dear, you haven’t started having the nightmares yet, have you?” Without waiting for Danny’s answer he continued, “Well, you’ll have to learn some day, I’m sure. Would you like me to teach you how to do it?”

Danny met his gaze. It took him a moment for the question to sink in. Vlad thought it possible for him to learn this technique as well. Those cold grey (red?) eyes penetrated his mind and sent a shiver down Danny’s spine. “No.” he finally said. “I want you to trust me or get out. I’m not drifting with anyone who doesn’t trust me cause I don’t really want to end up as a walking kaiju snack pack.” He shrugged. The other man looked completely taken aback. Looked like maybe he’d been able to even the score. The elevator dinged and the doors creaked open. “It’s your choice, old man,” Danny turned to walk back down the hallway. “You want back in the Jaeger pilot lime light, you gotta play by my rules.”

~~~

“Your neural activity hasn’t changed from the last tests we took. No sign of malignant tumor formation,” the doctor flipped papers over her clipboard, “Still not entirely sure what went wrong, but whatever it is seems to have fixed itself right up.” She smiled at Danny, “Heard about your drift this morning. I’m glad you’re able to get back in the program. You jaeger pilots are a godsend, I tell you.”

Danny grinned sheepishly at his doctor’s compliments. “Yeah, well, I’m pretty excited about it.”

“I can imagine. Have your parents stopped by to check on how you’re doing?”

“Mom was in a few minutes ago,” he recalled, “She had to take her own tests. Ghost drifting research. I’m kind of a special case.”

The doctor nodded. “You’re folks sure are something else. Not sure if they’re batshit or brilliant and most of the time I’m inclined to say both.” She checked a few of the devices Danny was hooked up to and scribbled down some numbers. “Well, the good news for you is I think you’re ready to move back into the academy barracks. We don’t have any reason to keep you here further and training is going to be starting up pretty soon so you’re outta here, kid.”

“Wait, seriously?”

“Yeah, seriously. We’ve done all the tests we need. So go on and get back to normal life,” she laughed, “or as normal as your life can be, I suppose.”

“Wow, uh, thanks,” Danny removed the sticky pads and wires from his forehead and scrambled off the bed to start packing up. He shoved clean and dirty clothes into his backpack without bothering to fold them. There would be time to sort through everything once he got back to his room.

“We might call you in again for later testing,” she admitted, “But until then enjoy your freedom.”

That was exactly what Danny planned to do as he hauled himself and half his worldly possessions back across the base to the academy barracks. It was strangely empty, which occasionally happened during the short vacation periods between years. The concrete halls echoed with the sound of his shuffling footsteps as he made his way to the door of his room.

The sheets hadn’t been changed for weeks and the entire room smelled faintly dusty but his pictures were on the walls and his desk chair sat at the foot of his bed. He dropped his backpack with a muffled whoomph sound on the floor and walked over to flop face first on his bed spread. It felt good to be home. Everything was familiar and comforting and the past few weeks seemed strangely distant. His eyes drifted shut and his breathing slowed. His mind floated along almost empty, surrounded by the feeling of safety.

The bed was soft and his sheets weren’t as scratchy as the ones in the med bay. The lights he’d turned on weren’t as harsh. Something smelled vaguely like ammonia, but he couldn’t quite place what it was. He stretched, vertebrae cracking all the way down his spine. There was a tension low in his ribcage he couldn’t stretch out properly. Danny groaned and rolled over onto his back. There was no way he was going to be able to sit in his bed for the rest of the day after spending weeks cooped up in a hospital room. He figured he should find something to keep him occupied until dinner.

~ ~ ~

There was something wrong with his equilibrium. Danny took another swing at the practice dummy, lunging forward too far and throwing himself off balance. Sure he wasn’t the most athletically talented of jaeger trainees, but this lack of coordination wasn’t usual for him. At least the gym was empty and there was no one to make fun of his clumsiness.

“Having an off day, Danny?”

Danny jumped and spun around. “Oh, Jaz,” he sighed in relief, “thought you might have been somebody else.”

“Nope, just me,” she shrugged, “same old me as I’ve always been.” She paused, smiling expectantly at him.

He glanced around. This was pretty normal behavior for Jaz, but that didn’t make it any less awkward. “So, what’s up?”

“Oh, nothing,” she continued smiling, “just thought maybe you’d want to talk.”

He gave a halfhearted shrug. Talk about what, Jaz? My brush with death? Not being able to drift like a normal human being? Needing to drift with someone super untrustworthy in order to achieve my dreams? “Not really.”

“Ok, ok, that’s fine too,” Jaz backed up, pretending this was no big deal at all. “It’s all good. I’ll just give you some space then.” Danny turned back to poke the target dummy with his staff. His sister was still visible out of the corner of his eye and he continued watching her, waiting for her to leave.

Jaz, on the other hand, had no intention of leaving, it seemed. She shrugged off her jacket and walked over to pick up a staff of her own. With light steps and determination she began running through the limited set of moves she knew. Her kicks and strikes were direct and to-the-point. The expertise of years of practice wasn’t there, but she had potential. Jaz Fenton always had potential, she was nothing but potential. She was the kind of person who was just good at everything, no matter what she tired. She spun 180 degrees, landing hard on her left heel and pushing that momentum through to a right-foot low kick and a staff jab to the head. It looked to Danny like she’d practiced that move for months. But he knew what kind of a schedule she had. She literally did not have time for that kind of intensive training. She was just gifted.

“What?” she asked. Danny realized he’d been staring. “Think I’m cool or something?”

Danny snorted, “Cool? Nah, I think you’re a huge dork.”

“A dork? Really?” Jaz gasped in mock offense, “Watch it, Fenton, those are fighting words.”

“Oh, you think you could take me?”

“After a few weeks in the hospital? I think I could hold my own.”

Danny laughed. “You’re on!”

As soon as the two got on the sparring mat Danny felt his body right itself. The strange balance issues he’d been having seemed to disappear, or at least he wasn’t noticing them having as much of an effect. Jaz was putting her all into every swing and he was having a rough time keeping up with her and dodging them all. He slipped to the left and ducked under her swing, pulling into a crouch to launch for her side. She twisted and managed to knock him over only to have her legs twisted out from underneath her. They both rolled away and got back up, breathing hard and grinning like maniacs. He occasionally forgot that he and Jaz were drift compatible too. It wasn’t a hugely uncommon thing to be drift compatible with multiple family members, but Jaz was just so… different. A straight A’s honor student studying drift science and the psychology of jaeger pilots, Jaz was accomplished and an over achiever. Not to mention, she had no interest in being a Jaeger pilot, herself. Comparing all that to his own academic abilities and the fact that the jaeger program was pretty much his life, Danny figured the two of them couldn’t be more different.

Jaz swung around, connecting lightly with the left side of Danny’s ribcage. He countered up, knocking the staff away with a cracking sound, swinging the other end up towards her chin and stopping just short of contact. She shrugged and spun in, shouldering him in the hip and twisting her arm in to grip an ankle and throw him off balance. Danny yelped and threw his weight back into the fall, jerking her down along with him. The two rolled again. Danny ended up with a knee on her chest and a staff to his throat.

He stood up, offering her a hand. “You know, Dad’s gonna need a new copilot now that I’m some sort of special case.”

She took his hand and pulled herself up, scoffing at his suggestion. “You say that as if he hasn’t already asked me about it.” Danny felt the grin drop off his face. “Come on, you’re the one who got all of the weird fighting talent. Beating up monsters just isn’t my cup of tea.” Jaz set her staff neatly on the floor and began stretching her muscles out. “But I’m curious, what’s up with the guy they mysteriously found to drift with you? I heard he used to work with Mom and Dad on their ghost drifting research but he’s been gone for a while now.”

“Wasn’t just that,” Danny followed along with Jaz’s stretching, “He was Dad’s copilot back in the day.”

“Get out.”

“No, really.”

“Huh,” Jaz reached towards her toes, “So, what’s his damage?”

“Damage?”

“Every jaeger pilot’s got damage, especially one who left the field. /Especially/ especially one who’s drift compatible with Dad.”

“I mean, he seems a little buggy. Also he’s got a huge gross old guy crush on Mom.”

“Hm.”

Danny stopped mid-stretch. “That’s it? I just told you there’s a complete stranger living at this base who’s completely head over heels for our mother and you say ‘hm’?”

“Mom’s an adult,” Jaz shrugged, “I trust her to make the right decision.” She froze, “Wait, you didn’t see anything about the two of them in his mind, right? Like, are you sure it was just a one sided crush?”

“Oh my god.” Danny gagged.

“Danny, I’m serious!”

“So am I!” He made a face of disgust and collapsed backwards onto the mat. “I don’t even wanna think about that. That’s super gross, Jaz. How could you?”

Jaz snickered. “So I take it you’re not going to check out the possible memories next time you drift.”

“I take back all the nice things I’ve ever said about you. You are the worst big sister ever.” He grumbled. For a moment he considered telling her. The thing that Masters had done when he’d discovered the man’s secret affection. She probably wouldn’t know what was going on, but maybe she would be able to help. Or maybe she would pull a drift-compatibility-therapist move and deem the relationship too unhealthy for them to continue as copilots. That would throw a wrench in his plan.

Jaz let out a deep sigh and pulled herself back upright. “Well, the worst big sister is pretty gross and exhausted now. I’m gonna go wash up. See you at dinner, little bro.”

That was the time to call out to her. If he wanted her help he had to ask, had to open up and say something. “Sure, see you at dinner.”

Danny stared up at the ceiling of the gym as his sister took her shoes and waltzed off.

Damn. Did all jaeger pilots have issues communicating or was it just him?


	3. Chapter 3

The sea was vast and huge, stretching before him like a field. On the edges of his vision he could see the slight rounding of the earth. In front, the faint outline of the coast was barely visible in the distance. Some presence in his mind pushed him towards the coast and he obeyed, strong legs churning the ocean into frothy waves. After a few hours of swimming he could see land more clearly. Jagged buildings thrust upwards towards the clouds. His heartbeat quickened and he pushed towards the shore as fast as his legs could take him. Chattering and clicking echoed in the back of his skull chamber, driving him towards the shore, towards the buildings and their imminent destruction.

When he reached them, nothing was safe. Concrete crumbled like dust. Steel beams cracked and bent. Cables snapped from their supports. The miniscule inhabitants of this dimension scattered and screamed but there was no where they could truly hide. He was a creature built for destruction, this mayhem was quite literally his only purpose in life. And while there may have been thousands of monstrosities far more advanced than him back in the anteverse, here he was unparalleled.

A low rumble and metallic clanking was suddenly discernable over the sounds of destruction and the blare of the kaiju attack warning sirens. He turned and saw them.

They approached from his left flank. Two metal monstrosities with glinting body armor and far too few limbs advanced on him, weapons at the ready. The kaiju recognized what they were. The creatures were dangerous and nothing like flesh and blood, but there was flesh in there somewhere and all it had to do was find it and crush it.

An unfamiliar impulse in the back of its mind named them.

“Crimson Typhoon. Mark Four. One of the last.”

“Cygnus Lightning. Mark Six. Still the fastest jaeger ever made.”

The source of the unfamiliar thoughts recoiled as if waking from a dream to the carefully controlled chaos of a hive mind command. Thousands of minds buzzing as one whirled with information. Thousands of minds worked towards a single goal. One mind among thousands found himself lost in the swell, trying desperately to hold onto itself in a whirlwind of screams for blood. Every fiber of the hive mind was now bent on the destruction of the giant metal apes.

The kaiju roared, a sound that could be heard for miles, like a thunderclap. But suddenly, everything was silent.

The lone voice had been expelled.

-_-__-_

Danny woke in a cold sweat, gasping for air. His room was dark and unfamiliar. The concrete walls seemed to be closing in around him. He stumbled out of bed, tripping over his own feet like a newborn foal on the deck of a rocking ship. Dear god, everything was spinning. Thankfully there was no one awake or even around to see him as he staggered to the men’s bathroom at the end of the hall.

This couldn’t become a regular thing, he thought to himself as he crouched on the floor of a bathroom stall. He was already the butt of so many teasing jokes without the added ammunition of dry heaving in the dorm restrooms after a nightmare.

That nightmare…

Danny clenched his jaw. It had felt too real to be just a nightmare. Even now the memory of it wasn’t fading like a dream would have. His body felt sore from exertion. That spot in his lower ribcage ached and walking upright felt alien and wrong. He pulled himself up off the floor and leaned on the wall for support as he dragged himself into one of the shower stalls instead. He tore off his boxers and tank top and turned the shower on full blast. He sank back into the support of the shower wall and let the cold water wash away the sweat.

Slowly, he began to feel more like himself again. He focused on feeling grounded in his own body. He stared down at his toes in the gathering pool of water and wiggled them a bit. Alright, toes responding and accounted for. He ran his hands over his knees, down over his shins, and back up to his thighs, concentrating on the familiarity of his body. These were his knobby knees and scratchy, stubbly calves. He recognized the faint scar on his right thigh, just above his knee from one of the many biking accidents he’d had. His hips, his chest, his stomach, everything was accounted for. He noticed his breathing had slowed and his heartrate was back to normal. He ran his fingers through his hair, working out all the tangles.

The shower spray turned off with a squeak of the handle and Danny realized he’d forgotten to bring a towel. Cold, damp, and a little miserable, Danny shook off as much water as he could and slipped back into his clothes. Back in his room he pulled on an extra t shirt and pajama pants, deciding that was enough clothing for showing up at the mess hall in the middle of the night. It was about two in the morning by the time he actually got down there, but the lights were on and there was fresh coffee in all the machines. There were always technicians working and running about and when the safety of the world rested on a bunch of people able to run giant battle mechs at any time of day, 24 hour coffee was a necessity. A few of said technicians buzzed around the hall in groups, discussing projects and base gossip. Danny wandered invisibly among them. He grabbed a cup of coffee, loading it up with cream and sugar.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw a flash of silver and turned to see Vlad Masters who looked much worse for wear than the last time they’d seen each other. His hair was still pulled back but the ponytail looked messy and haphazard. His suit jacket was missing, his dress shirt hung partially unbuttoned, his tie was loose and crooked. He walked with the same air of confidence and self-importance that he always seemed to have. But to Danny it looked almost fake this time, like he had pulled it on for show but was a few threads way from losing it entirely. He stood and watched as the older man rounded the corner and disappeared.

Vlad had mentioned something about nightmares the last time they’d spoken. Danny hadn’t thought anything of it at the time but as he remembered the conversation a shiver ran down his spine.

This man was getting more and more suspicious with each day.

-.-..-.-

“There was another kaiju attack last night!” Maddie Fenton always sounded disturbingly gleeful when talking about the giant beasts and the destruction they were responsible for. Danny was accustomed to the quirks of his parents and their attitudes towards the kaiju, but this time the words formed an icy cold pit in his stomach. His mother took no notice. She continued buttering her toast and babbling in an excited, sing song tone. “The brute made it all the way to shore before even being intercepted, fastest kaiju on record! They even took it down in the middle of the cityscape, so there might be some new samples for us to work with soon enough!”

He could still faintly remember the feeling of buildings collapsing under his own weight and the ocean water running like rivers down off his armored body.

“Anywhere near us?” Jaz asked.

“No, it was-“

“Hong Kong.” Danny interrupted, not lifting his gaze from his bowl of cereal. He’d never been to Hong Kong before, but he’d seen pictures of the jaeger military base there, the Shatterdome. And he knew which jaegers were stationed there.

“Exactly!” His mother continued, cheerily. “So, the majority of the samples will likely go to the research facility in Okinawa, but I’ve put in a few special requests, so who knows! Here’s hoping for something big!”

Jaz looked at Danny. Her expression was puzzled and curious and Danny did his best to ignore it. She knew something was up. Of course, what had he expected? She wasn’t their parents. Jaz noticed everything. He shoveled the rest of his cereal into his mouth and quickly excused himself from the table. If she asked him about it later he’d just act offended and say she wasn’t the only one in the family who watched the news. She was touchy about underestimating him.

“Danny! Don’t forget we’re testing your fighting style compatibility later today!” Maddie called after him.

Shoot. He’d forgotten all about that. “Sure Mom, I’ll be there.”

-…--.-

Sam and Tucker were online. Sam and Tucker were always online. Tucker prided himself on always having the latest and greatest technology and if he didn’t have it well that was fine because anything that he could tweak was better than the most cutting edge stuff you could buy. Sam was nowhere near as technologically talented as Tucker was, but somehow she always managed to have quality computers and flawless wi-fi. Danny was pretty grateful he had such excellent choice in online friends. He imagined his life would be a lot more difficult if his only friends could only be contacted a few times a week at the most.

They were really the best he had, after all. No matter what kind of problems he came to them with they were always supportive and understanding and willing to suspend their disbelief.

“Guys, I think I might have drifted with a kaiju.”

After a few moments of silence he checked to make sure the group chat was still working. Both of his friends were seemingly frozen on screen.

“Wait, you think you what now?”

“When the hell did this happen?”

“Where did you even get a kaiju brain? Are those on the black market? Oh my- Danny, did you actually get something on the black market?!”

“How the hell did this happen?”

“Danny, what’s going on here? What do you mean?”

Danny let out a frustrated sigh, “I don’t know what’s going on. I’m just telling you what I think ok? You gotta hear me out.”

“Alright then.”

“Let the man talk, Sam!”

“Ok,” Danny took a deep breath, “So, I had this really weird dream last night. Only, I don’t think it was a dream, not really. I think I might have been ghost drifting with the kaiju from last night’s attack on Hong Kong.”

“Ok? And you think this because…?”

“I know things about the attack –remember things- that I shouldn’t know. I knew it was in Hong Kong and that the kaiju had reached the coast and that it was taken down by Crimson Typhoon and Cygnus Lightning before I even watched the broadcasts on the attack.” He glanced at the computer screen to see his friends frowning. Sam’s brow was furrowed in a way that said concern. Tucker looked like he was trying to figure out a particularly difficult puzzle. Neither of them looked like they didn’t believe him. “It was weird, I thought it was a dream, I mean, I woke up afterwards. But it didn’t feel like a dream. I was up all night thinking about it, but it hit me this morning. I knew I’d experienced something like it before, it was just that kaiju minds are so different from human minds I didn’t recognize it right away. I was ghost drifting.”

“Neurally connecting without a PONs, for those of us who don’t know,” Tucker explained.

“I know what ghost drifting is,” Sam snapped.

“Yeah, well I remembered it was the same as when I would have dreams where I was my dad, working really late on the ghost PONs tech,” he paused, reevaluating his statement, “Well, not exactly the same. I never felt like throwing up after ghost drifting with my dad unless he’d had a really disgusting midnight snack or something. But there were definitely some similarities.”

“So do you have any idea what might have caused this?”

“I- I don’t know. That is, I don’t know for certain. But I have this theory. I think that whatever happened to me in the ghost PONs accident changed me. I think that’s why I can’t drift with humans anymore. It’s cause I’m neurally connected to the kaiju hive mind or something.”

“But I thought you could still drift? What about Masters?”

What about Masters? That was the only hitch in Danny’s theory, really. Everything else seemed to check out pretty smoothly. Danny scratched his head, “I think there’s a lot of things I don’t know about Masters. He’s kind of a sketchy dude. But I know that he was up at the same time that I was last night, and he mentioned knowing about the nightmares before my first one even happened.” 

“That sure sounds suspicious.”

“Everything about this guy sounds suspicious.”

There was the sound of a small beeping alarm and all three of them scrambled to find what it was. After a moment, Tucker responded. “Shoot, sorry guys, I’m almost late for class. Gotta go!”

“You have class already? I thought it was still summer vacation,” Sam mentioned, but their tech savvy friend had already left the video chat. She sighed, “I’ll be honest, I’ve got some stuff I should be preparing for, too. You gonna be alright, Danny? This is some pretty heavy stuff to be dealing with.”

Danny nodded. “Don’t worry about me. I’m sure I’ll figure something out.”

-.-.-.---.

Danny wandered down to the sparring room about a half an hour before the second drift test was supposed to begin. His balance seemed better than it had the day before, but he wanted to make sure he wasn’t going to make a fool out of himself. He kicked off his shoes and walked over to the rack of staffs.

“Good afternoon, Daniel,” Danny whirled around at the voice behind him. “I admit, I didn’t think I’d be seeing you here early.” So much for preparing in private, he thought. Vlad Masters stepped lightly through the doorway, shoes in hand.

“I admit, I didn’t think I’d be seeing you at all, old man,” Danny snarked back. The man chuckled in a condescending tone as he set his shoes down on the edge of the sparring mats and began stretching. He was dressed in a white tank top and sweatpants which seemed incredibly at odds with his usual suit and tie wardrobe. It made sense, practically speaking, but it was still weird to see.

The truly weird part of it was the scars. Most jaeger pilots had scars. That was just a fact of life and a hazard from the job. The earlier the jaeger model they piloted, the more likely they were to be scarred up and the most common ones came from electrical surges in the suits. They were nasty burns in geometric lines making the human body look like a circuit board of some sort. Jaegers that were partially destroyed in battle would go on the fritz and with no information being communicated from missing mech pieces, the suits would malfunction. His father had a lot. His mother had less.

Vlad’s scars stood out in high contrast against his pale skin. They were harsh red and pink and surrounded by a faint tint of blue, as if the tissue around them was still bruised and healing, but Danny knew that couldn’t have been the case. He knew those scars were older than he was because the patterns etched along Masters’ right arm were the same as the faint white lines Danny had traced on his father’s skin when he was a kid being held and shushed and told to go to sleep.

Danny shook his head. He still wasn’t entirely sure where he stood with Vlad Masters. Half his instincts told him this man was not to be trusted, but then every once in a while something like this would happen and Danny couldn’t be sure. After all, his father trusted him with his life, and Masters had done the same. The two of them had the scars to prove it. What had changed?

“Daniel, my boy, would you mind tossing one of those sticks over this way? Or would you rather stare off into space for another hour or two?”

Danny clenched his jaw and tossed over a staff. “You seem pretty full of yourself for a guy who’s been out of the game for over a decade.”

Vlad caught the staff, slowly twirling it around in his hands for a moment. He pulled the weapon through his grip and shifted into a guard Danny recognized but couldn’t quite name. “All the more reason to get back into practice, I think. Shall we?”

Danny grinned and pulled himself into defense. “Please, after you.”

Vlad was stronger than he looked in his suit. The smooth cut lines and angles hid the bulk of an above average frame of muscles. His swing packed quite a punch. Luckily for him, Danny was fast and used to dodging and ducking and turning his opponent’s strength against him. He slipped and slid through the other man’s offense until the perfect time to strike presented and he jabbed upwards towards the man’s chin, stopping just short of impact. “One to zero. Sure you don’t wanna give up while you still can? Save yourself some humiliation?”

Vlad snarled and twisted his staff up between Danny’s arms. In moments he had the young man face down on the ground and a weapon at his throat. “One to one. Your father really ought to have taught you some manners.”

He felt the pressure on the mat and made an educated guess at where Vlad’s feet were positioned. Flipping around, he brought the other man down to the floor with him and launched himself up to standing. “Two-one” Danny said with a smirk. Vlad growled at him, dragging himself up from his position on the mat. The two backed up and circled one another, waiting for the time to strike.

Danny was the first to move forward, picking his steps across the floor. He feigned to one side and brought the other end of his staff around just barely faster than Vlad could bring his guard up.

“Three-one,” Vlad mused, sounding more than a bit impressed. “How have the nightmares been treating you, Daniel? I take it you had your first one last night?”

Danny froze, “How did you kno- hey!” Vlad caught his leg and flipped him over.

“Three-two. Pay attention, little badger.” He tsked.

“Little badger?” Danny coughed, scrambling up off of the floor, “Are you kidding me right now?” He barely managed to dodge Vlad’s next two strikes. “I’m trying to figure out what’s going on here and you’re coming up with pet names?”

“And do you have any theories?” He danced just out of range of Danny’s offense. “About what is happening to you, I mean.”

“A few,” Danny thrust, connecting staff to ribcage. “And I’ve also got some theories on what the hell you might be. Trust me, none of them are pretty.”

Masters’ face twisted from a grimace of pain into a smug grin. He grabbed Danny’s staff, twisting the boy’s arm around behind him and joint locking it in place. Danny struggled against the hold, even though he knew there wasn’t a way to get out of it. He wanted to prove he wouldn’t be trapped easily, instead all he ended up doing was pressing his back against Vlad’s chest.

The man behind him chuckled. “So, you think I’m some awful, horrifying monster and yet you still want to be my copilot?”

Danny paused. He wasn’t entirely sure how to respond to that. It wasn’t entirely inaccurate, if he was being completely honest with himself. He could argue the use of the word “want.” He “wanted” to drift with Vlad Masters the same way people “wanted” to live on the pacific coastline. It was kind of his last and only option. At the same time, he knew the man had a lot that he could teach him, if he could be bothered to stop being an asshole for a minute. Not to mention, if their sparring match was any indication, Danny knew they would make for a pretty impressive team.

“Getting started without us?” Jack Fenton’s voice boomed throughout the sparring area. Vlad dropped Danny as if the young man’s skin was burning him. “Don’t mind us, you two can keep on warming up. We’ll just need to see one or two matches for the formal record.”

Danny massaged his arm joints and watched Vlad standing at the edge of the mat looking as stoic and bored as always. He caught the man’s eye and lifted his chin in a challenge. “So what, you wanna go again? Maybe less trash talk this time?”

Vlad’s eyes slid over to where his old friend was sitting, grinning like a madman, pen and notepad in hand. He seemed to be weighing his options but after a moment he merely shrugged and took an open stance. “Ready?”

Danny grinned. “Ready.”


	4. Chapter 4

The nightmares didn’t stop. Each night Danny woke shaking and sweating, made his way to the men’s bathroom for a shower and eventually ended up in the mess hall with a cup of coffee-flavored sugar. By the time he had shaken off the last of the post-kaiju-drifting dizziness Vlad was always there. He never looked quite as shaken up as he had that first night, but he was also never quite up to the standards he set in the daytime. They didn’t talk. They barely acknowledged each other’s existence. But Danny was always aware of Vlad’s presence in the room and he guessed the feeling went both ways.

The fact that he was already getting used to this schedule was what bothered Danny the most. Sure, he hadn’t thrown up since the first night and that was good news, but kaiju ghost drifting was never a pleasant experience. He took another sip of coffee, trying to drown out the taste of copper and ammonia. A non-caffeinated drink might have been a better choice if he wanted to get back to sleep that night, but planning ahead had never really been Danny’s specialty. He glanced up and noticed that Vlad was no longer in his usual spot across the room.

With a ceramic clink, someone set a coffee cup down on the table. “Mind if I join you?” Vlad didn’t wait for an answer as he sat down next to Danny and leaned forward on the table.

“Please, be my guest,” Danny grumbled sarcastically.

The two of them sat in silence, watching the technicians darting in and out of the room. Danny took another sip of his coffee. A moment ago it had been perfect. Now it was just this side of unpleasantly lukewarm. Steam rose from the cup to his right. Vlad must have just come from topping off his mug. His fingers gripped the cup loosely. Danny noticed that his nail beds and the tips of his fingers were the same bluish bruised color that surrounded his scars.

“You did very well in the ring the other day,” Vlad offered in a strained voice. “I probably should have told you at the time but…” he gave a halfhearted shrug at an explanation.

Danny eyed him suspiciously. “Okay? Thanks?” He wasn’t entirely sure why the man had come over to him. It didn’t seem likely that he would break routine just to pay the boy a compliment. Sitting this close to him, Danny could see the exhaustion on the man’s face. The wheels were turning in his head as if he was trying to figure out what to say next and how to keep the conversation going. Danny sighed. He was way too tired to deal with any sort of awkward talks with this man.

“It gets easier,” Vlad finally said, breaking the silence. Danny didn’t know what he had been expecting, but it wasn’t that. “It’s never enjoyable and there are times when it is worse than the first, but you adapt and eventually,” he frowned, “Eventually it becomes familiar. You get used to the feeling that you are missing multiple limbs and you learn to pretend your balance is still perfect. You stop throwing up regularly after the first few attacks. It still happens but not as often.” He turned slightly to meet Danny’s confused gaze. “It also helps to be able to pick and choose what you end up sharing with the hive mind.”

Danny frowned. “Is that why you learned to do the weird uh,” he reached for the proper word to describe what had happened in the drift between the two of them. “the weird thing you did?”

The other man chuckled. Danny bristled instinctively, waiting for some kind of insult. “Neural silencing,” he said, “That’s what I call it, at least. I don’t know if it has a formal name. I don’t even know if anyone else can truly do it.”

“You thought I could learn.”

He smiled. “Of course. You and I are more similar than you’d care to think.”

“Yeah, well, you’ve been able to learn a lot about me, haven’t you?” Danny said. Vlad flinched at the acid tone of the other man’s voice.

“You do know drifting isn’t the only way to get to know someone, right?” he sneered, “You can always just ask me what you wish to know.”

Danny shook his head. “Fine. If that’s how you’re gonna play it. How do you know my parents?”

“College,” Vlad answered, “at least, that’s where the three of us met. We didn’t really become friends until we all ended up transferring to the drift technology research section of the jaeger program. We were some of the first employees.”

“And you and my dad were copilots.”

Vlad grimaced, “It certainly wasn’t intentional.” He sighed. “The three of us were messing around with the compatibility tests. It was supposed to be a joke, we didn’t think any of us actually would have worked. But when Jack and I turned out to be compatible, well… they were a little short on pilots back in the beginning of the war. They had to take what they could get.”

“Hm. So, does my mom know you’re a creep who’s in love with her?”

He turned to shoot an icy stare at Danny. “If Maddie isn’t aware of my feelings for her I would be very surprised. It was never a secret from her, my dear boy.”

Danny took a sip of his coffee. By then it was definitely gross but it was better than meeting the other man’s glare. He could admit that the wording of the question might have been… less than polite. But the entire situation was so bizarre.

“Why did you leave?”

Vlad let out a deep sigh. His spoon clinked against the sides of his cup as he stirred the coffee. He seemed to be deep in thought or maybe entranced by the swirling movement of the coffee foam, but Danny was mostly glad the man had stopped glaring at him. “There was an accident, as I’m sure you must have gathered. But that wasn’t why I left. I had planned to come back to the lab after I got out of the hospital but… Life doesn’t stop and wait for you to play catch-up. I came back and things were different. I realized it was time for my life to move on as well.”

“So you became a millionaire.”

Vlad grinned, “So I became a billionaire.”

“Oh, right,” Danny said, “my mistake. A billionaire.”

“It would do you well to pay attention to particulars, Daniel.”

“Like the particulars of how you ended up becoming a billionaire in less than twenty years?” Danny grinned, “Please tell me, I’m dying to know.”

Vlad burst out laughing, real genuine laughter, and Danny had to bite back a yelp of surprise. “Oh come now, Daniel, I’m allowed to have some secrets, aren’t I?” Danny scowled. “OH please, I’m sure you’ll learn all about it soon enough. Save some mysteries for the solving, my boy.” Vlad patted him on the back and rose from his seat. “Now if you don’t mind, I’m going to try to get back to sleep.”

“You just had at least three cups of coffee, you old frootloop!”

Vlad smiled at him, “Decaf, little badger. Sweet dreams.”

-_-_

Since before he could remember Danny had been poked and prodded and subjected to countless tests he still didn’t fully understand. His parents had full access to their drift science technology while they were raising him. Usually this meant Maddie and Jack would work on experiments with Danny strapped into a baby backpack and Jaz running around underfoot. Usually it meant there were dolls and toy cars strewn around the floor of the laboratory and that Jaz’s Albert Einstein teddy bear was always making new inventions out of the drift tech refuse. Usually it meant that he knew what tools did what before he could pronounce their technical names. Sometimes it meant he would be strapped into a drift tech suit and have his brain waves monitored.

He’d been in elementary school before he found out this was not something most kids had gone through and the revelation had just further confirmed him as a social oddity and an outcast. Weirdo Danny Fenton with his weird parents and their weird fringe science theories. Weird Danny who sometimes came to school with adhesive pads still stuck to his forehead and didn’t understand why he was the only one who knew what they were for? Didn’t the other kids’ parents have to see how kindergarten was affecting their drift potential? Didn’t their parents care about them?! Weird Danny who was sometimes pulled out of school to be run through a cat scan or hooked up to a test mech or neurally connected to his weird big sister.

It hadn’t helped that he’d been seen as a small dorky tomboy of a girl back then. Jaz was weird but pretty and smart and she was eventually accepted despite her weirdness. Danny just kept getting weirder. He geeked out about space and drift tech and the limited knowledge of the anteverse. He started going by “Danny” and using he pronouns. His only friends couldn’t even hang out with him in person. Sure, he got into the jaeger academy, but that kind of cool didn’t outweigh the amount of weird he had been before.

For a while he had resented his parents and the weirdness they seemed to have genetically passed on to him. It was an easy cause to get behind when Jaz was always going on about everything they were doing wrong, according to the national standards of drift psychology. They broke a surprising number of rules and Danny was never sure how they were able to get away with it and still be employed by the Pan Pacific Defense Corp. Hell, sometimes he wasn’t sure how he and Jaz hadn’t been taken away by child services. There were more than a few tests he’d done that could definitely be described as “willful endangerment of a minor.” But however dangerous it had all been, Danny couldn’t deny that there was something weirdly comforting in being hooked up to machines and computer monitors by his mother.

Maddie Fenton was definitely the more capable of the two Fenton parents. Over the course of her service in the PPDC she’d managed to take down a few kaiju, pioneer multiple new fields of science, and raise two children all while keeping any Jack-Fenton-created disasters to a minimum. She was kind of a big deal.

“Your vitals are normal, and so is your neural activity. But the ghost drift scanners are still picking up some bizarre interference,” she said, fussing with the device strapped to the base of Danny’s neck. “Hm, that’s so strange. It seemed to be working fine when I tested it on Jack’s ghost drifting signature this morning…”

Danny twisted his head around to get a look at the monitors. “Interference? Wait, what do the numbers say?” He didn’t get to see much before his mom grabbed hold of his head, turning it back around to the front.

“Please keep still, darling,” she said while re-securing a few monitors and tightening some straps. “The sensors are registering an unrealistically high level of ecto-waves.”

Danny wracked his brain for what that terminology meant. “So, you’re saying I’m ghost drifting right now?”

Maddie laughed, “Well, are you?” Danny considered the question. It didn’t feel like he was, but then again, if Vlad had been able to calm his thoughts in the drift, who’s to say he wasn’t able to do the same during a ghost drift scenario. Danny gulped. “No, no, these numbers are at unprecedented levels.” Maddie continued muttering, “Even when we were lucky enough to catch copilots in the middle of a ghost drifting episode none of their ecto-waves were ever this high. The sensors must be malfunctioning. I’ll have to recalibrate them.” She unhooked a few sensors and wires from Danny’s scalp and spine. “Do you mind waiting for me to finish this, Danny?”

Danny shrugged, “I’ve got time.”

“Thanks, sweetie.” Maddie planted a kiss on Danny’s forehead. “This shouldn’t take long at all.”

She wandered off across the lab to gather the tools she needed. Danny sat where he was, still hooked up to a number of monitors. He turned to glance at the screens. Most of the displays were familiar, but the numbers and levels being recorded were unlike he’d ever seen them. He sighed and looked away. It wasn’t as if he needed any more proof of how much he had changed in the accident.

His mother hummed away as she recalibrated the ecto-wave sensors. Her hands moved swiftly and expertly, pushing buttons and disconnecting parts with fluid ease. Danny tapped his foot on the floor nervously. In spite of the comforting familiarity of the lab he was worried. Being put through tests and experiments was all fine and dandy when you knew there was probably nothing wrong with you. Now he wasn’t so sure how he felt about it all.

On top of that, he’d realized how little he actually knew about his parents. He barely knew anything about what they had been like and what their lives had been like when he was a kid and then back before he had been born. He should have been able to pick up on it from his father. Hell, he should have had some of Vlad’s memories from when the man had shared thoughts with Jack. But Jack was not a man who lived in the past. It was funny now as Danny thought back on it that the only thing his father drowned out more than his copilot’s memories were his own.

“Mom?” He started, hesitantly.

“What is it, sweetie?”

“Why did you and Dad join the PPDC?”

Maddie shrugged and continued with her calibrations, “It seemed like the right thing to do. Our research was really gaining traction and with the jaeger program we had an actual, real world application for it. It’s rare for that kind of opportunity to just come along. The funding was nice, too.”

Danny nodded. “I didn’t realize Masters worked with you two.”

“Hm, really? Vlad was such a huge part of our research team. The three of us were basically inseparable for the longest time.” She mused. “I think it was right before you were born that he had that accident that put him in the hospital. But we’d been working together a long time before then.” She paused in her scientific rituals to look at him in sudden realization, “You know, now that I think of it, he never did stop by to meet you once he recovered. And I’d sent him plenty of emails about you.” She turned back to the machine she was tweaking. “I’ll have to ask him about that sometime. It was really rude of him to completely drop contact like that.” With a triumphant sigh she brought the guage back over to where Danny was seated, still muttering to herself, “After all, if he had enough time to make his fortune, you’d think he’d have time to visit his closest friends every once in a while or even just send them a postcard.” She hooked the machine back into its original cords and plugs. “You know, I’m surprised you don’t already know all this, though. Your father never mentioned it in the drift?”

Danny shrugged. “Nah. Dad doesn’t do much unnecessary thinking.”

Maddie seemed to ignore that last comment as she fired up the ecto-wave recorder again. The machine beeped on and instantly began to go on the fritz. The sensors were still overloaded. Maddie sighed and turned the machine off. “There’s something wrong with this thing. Why don’t we try it again another time? I’ve got all the data I can get from the other sensors.” Danny began removing the various straps and sticky pads that held all the other sensors in place. One by one, each of the monitors went blank. His mom organized the cords and instruments, placing them carefully on the table next to her in an order that only she would be able to understand and remember.

He got up from his chair and stretched out, popping the stiffness out of his neck and joints. He watched his mother going about her business in the lab. She hadn’t changed all that much from the memories he’d picked up from Vlad’s mind. Her hair was tinted with grey and her skin was worn and creased in some places, but her energy was as bubbly and intense as ever.

Danny frowned. There was so much about his mother that he’d always just taken for granted, and now that there were things about her past that he wanted to know he had no idea how to ask her.

“I’ll see you at dinner I guess.” He called back to her on his way out of the lab. There were plenty of other ways to get the information he needed.


End file.
